Dave McCormick won Pennsylvania by following Donald Trump’s formula of reaching disengaged voters
The senator-elect’s campaign reached out to less-engaged voters in an effort to ramp up turnout within his base. It worked.
Sen.-elect Dave McCormick was the first GOP gubernatorial or U.S. Senate candidate to win Pennsylvania since 2016. And he did it by taking the path charted by President-elect Donald Trump.
As Trump’s team did, McCormick’s campaign made a concerted effort to mobilize low-propensity voters, specifically those who were poised to support Trump but were otherwise turned off from other GOP candidates, NOTUS reported. McCormick’s significant focus on this voting bloc serves as a contrast to previous Republican candidates, who historically had tended to take turnout among their base for granted.
The McCormick campaign’s desire to reach disaffected voters was underscored by several key efforts. Two weeks before Election Day, McCormick filmed an ad at West Point, his alma mater, to showcase his military service in an effort to reach highly coveted apolitical voters who may have been distrustful of politicians.
For disengaged voters far from metropolitan areas, the campaign also deployed its door-to-door field program to identify these individuals so the McCormick team could send texts and mailers, and advertise on their rural radio stations. The campaign even aired a litany of ads during football games.
These efforts in combination with other tactics — like a statewide bus tour and ads that sought to get ahead of Democratic talking points — helped make McCormick the only Republican candidate to win in a swing-state Senate race this year
McCormick ultimately unseated three-term U.S. Sen. Bob Casey (D., Pa.), a surprising result in the nationally watched Senate race.
But while the end of Casey’s 18-year tenure came as a shock to many, his popularity had been quietly falling for months, making him vulnerable to the significant financial support behind McCormick, a former hedge fund executive.
In previous races, the senior senator was victorious during years where Democratic turnout was strong — 2006 amid the growing dissent of the Iraq War, former President Barack Obama’s reelection in 2012, and during the blue wave of the 2018 midterms.
In 2012, Casey outperformed Obama by 1.7 percentage points among Pennsylvania voters, and his margin of victory over GOP Senate candidate Tom Smith was 3.7 percentage points greater than Obama’s over Republican Mitt Romney.
But in 2024, Casey did not outperform Vice President Kamala Harris, as Democratic observers had hoped he would be able to do even if Trump won Pennsylvania. Casey received 48.6% of the vote statewide, while Harris garnered 48.66%.
These results didn’t help Casey, whom McCormick consistently tied to Harris and who was seeking to be reelected in a political climate that favored Trump much more than expected. Trump won Pennsylvania with more votes than any Republican statewide candidate in history by bolstering his support in rural areas and chipping away at Harris’ base in suburban and urban areas. McCormick — who made sure to appear at almost every Trump rally in the state — rode on Trump’s coattails, though he slightly underperformed Trump in the state, with 48.82% to Trump’s 50.37%.
Casey told The Inquirer last month that he owed his loss to Trump’s popularity in Pennsylvania. He also didn’t underestimate the extensive role that super PAC money played in the race.
Keystone Renewal PAC was the only outside spending group that was specifically dedicated to the U.S. Senate race in Pennsylvania and spent about $54 million. As the former CEO of Bridgewater Associates, the largest hedge fund in the world, McCormick was able to use his connections to cultivate a substantial financial backing powered by Wall Street billionaires. Many of the donors to Keystone Renewal knew McCormick personally.
“I think that combination was hard to overcome,” Casey said last month. “It’s the end of a chapter, but it’s for me, it was a blessing to be able to serve. … You always want to win again, but that wasn’t meant to be.”